Visitors at Whinlatter watched on television screens as KL, the ringed female, laid her first egg at Bassenthwaite on April 23, followed by another two eggs on April 26 and 29. It is believed that she has returned from Africa with the same unringed male as last year to the same site.

Meanwhile further south in Cumbria a pair of the Ospreys have settled at a peatbog near Witherslack and it is hoped that the site will get its first chicks later this year.

The male has a white ring on his right leg, indicating he was born at Bassenthwaite in 2008 and the female has a right blue leg ring and was born in Kielder Forest in 2010.

The site is a large expanse of raised bog close to the River Kent and Morecambe Bay – both good sources of fish.

A VERY small Beatrix Potter drawing has sold for nearly £50,000 at an auction in America.

The three-and-three-quarter inches by six inches ink and watercolour had been expected to sell for up to 37,500 at the Sotheby's auction, in New York, but reached £47,438

The miniature, called 'Guinea pigs going to their garden...' was among 193 original illustrations sold by wealthy American couple, Kendra and Allan Daniel. The painting depicts four guinea pigs following a fifth along a path carrying garden tools.

A spokesman for Sotheby's said: "Early in 1893, when she was in her twenties, Beatrix Potter borrowed a number of guinea pigs from her friend, Miss Paget. One, named Mr Chopps, proved to be no problem but another, named Queen Elizabeth, apparently 'took to eating blotting paper, pasteboard, string and other curious substances and expired during the night. A pair of gardening illustrations date from this time: four guinea pigs following a blue-coated guinea pig and four guinea pigs working under the guidance of the blue-coated guinea pig.

"These were later redrawn in 1922 and used in Potter's book Cecil Parsley's Nursery Rhymes."